Licensing Act

Up to a point. The proposal is late and fairly small, and I will speak about it at greater length shortly, although any movement on the part of the Government is clearly welcome. As I said, I was acting in a different capacity when the Bill was going through Parliament, and it was notable that much of the debate then related to the implementation of what the media termed 24-hour drinking. As we all know, very few establishments applied to open for 24 hours. Nevertheless, there have been concerns about the impact of shifting closing times, and the Committee received some worrying evidence from the police about the effect in inner cities. The Police Federation made a strong case for the view that the period when there was most public disorder and potential for problems had simply shifted from the period between 11 pm and midnight to between 2 am and 3 am. That obviously put much greater strain on the police and meant that their shifts had to be longer, with more overtime. Generally, the measure has not really led to a reduction in the problems they faced, but has simply shifted them to a more inconvenient time both for them and, presumably, for residents in local communities.